Classical order

Abstract: The paper deals with research on structural relations between architectural education andcultural and human sciences. The paper addresses two major premises. Firstly the cultural role that architecture can play in the shaping of the ongoing process of democratisation of the global society. Derived here of is thesecond one: "What are the implications for our currentarchitectural education?” The argument develops over three stages.The first one concerns a subject in the field of cultural history, stating that, historically, architecture was commonly an expression of the ruling powers. The first paradigm is that of the earliest modern democracy, the USA. Its initial architectural expression was inspired by Thomas Jefferson who adapted the language of the classical order. The neoclassical style became the canon for the new state buildings: the capitols and the courthouses. This paradigm shows a contradiction and failure to project concepts of democracy and revolution into architecture. The second paradigm comes from the modern architectural movement of the interbellum period. It was inspired by revolutionary ideas of radical socialism and equal right movement, proclaimed and empowered by the USSR. This paradigm again shows ” albeit of another nature ” the failure to express the modern concept of democracy into an adequate architectural form. Both paradigms learn how astylistic canon dominated and misled the architectural shaping of a young, democratic society. In a second step, the paper focuses on two fundamental reflections. The first one highlights the relationship between democracy and style. A modern concept of liberty, for example, becomes visible in an architectural interpretation of Jefferson's original design for the first Academic Village, Virginia. In the analysis of this architectural realisation, a more subtle image of Thomas Jefferson emerges. He was the founder of the Declaration of Independence, the philosophical basis for the first modern, democratic state. The second reflection dwells on the only consistent democratic philosophy of the 20th century, that of John Dewey. His concept of creative democracy is relevant to educate the 'democratic consciousness' of young architects. It is further assumed that thinking in such a'democratic way' can help to release architecture from a dogmatic stylistic canon.The third and final step addresses the implications for architectural education. The challenge is the shaping of the student's social and political consciousness via an analysis of historical buildings freed from an encyclopaedic and uncritical approach.

Abstract: Many contemporary designs of interior design and architecture inspired by classical orders lack the standard basics and rules of this orders –especially the Golden Ratio – which resulted the appearance of designs which lack the values of classical aesthetic and visually distorted due to the absence of the accurate study of the determinates and values of the classical golden ratio. Study Significance: The study significance lay in it’s attempt to handle a factual problem in the field of scientific specialization which is the deformation of classical aesthetic ratio-especially the golden ratio – in the modern interior design works because of not analyzing their aesthetic value and standard ratio. Objectives: Determinate the aesthetic ratios of classical orders and it’s golden ratios and the mechanism of it’s application in interior design to be a reference to the designers in order to understand and evaluate classical aesthetic in the field of scientific specialization. Methodology: The research adopt the historical methodology through the study of the notion of golden ratio and the history of its emergence and application in classical architecture orders , in addition , the applied analytical descriptive methodology is adopted , as a through analysis is conducted to ratios and determinants of classical order and the application the study of the golden ratio in interior design. Results: The Golden Section is a known geometrical and mathematical ratio derived by the Greeks from the measurments of a harmonized ratios human body and the ratio exist between two numbers , spaces and sizes , as they used this ratio in all their designs which had a great effect in establishing aesthetic values of a design and which represented in the equilibrium and compatibility of all the pieces of the design and the choice of it’s ideal ratios , also it was applied later in many interior design and architecture designs, and this ratio is 1.61804. The Greek orders consists of three orders and they are: The Doric order – The Ionic order – The Corinthian order , each of these orders has it’s special ratios , thus designers discovered in them a source of inspiration and though which can be applied in designs through the ages for it’s aesthetic effect which characterized with agility and design accuracy of ratios. During classical ages , the determinants of inner space design spread generally in palaces and other buildings and they all based on the old classical order and the ratio of classical column , as the inner walls was divided into the same aesthetic ratios of classical order. characterized by their accuracy and fulfillment of classical aesthetic values

Abstract: Leonardo’s Adoration of the Magi’s (Galleria degli Uffizi) belongs to an iconographic and semantic tradition, which beneficed of an extraordinary evolution during the second half of the fifteenth century. In such representations the poor wooden construction described by the Bible is combined with the ruins of splendid classical buildings and mean the beginning of Christianity on one hand and the submitted pagan era on the other. A comparison of the two drawings of Leonardo, held in the Louvre and the Gabinetto Disegni e Stampe of the Uffizi, and the unfinished painting reveals the various steps of the development of the architectural background. Recent ultraviolet studies identified different solutions, conceived and then abandoned by Leonardo, which allow to reconstruct the ruins and architectural fragments in a more detailed manner. In the first version, the Holy family is placed before a heterogeneous structure of wood and stone, while an antique ruin with two flights of stairs raises on the right side. The drawing of the Uffizi focuses its attention on this ruin now shifted to the left side, while the stairs advance strongly toward the centre. On the right side a fragment of a classical order completes the feature, which evokes an antique forum. In the painting the Holy family is situated is the foreground, without any wooden construction to protect them, and the ruin, whose structure and position is slightly changed, is linked to it by the moving of figures and animals. Like in the drawing of the Uffizi many busy craftsmen reveal that the ruin is intended as a building site. The parallel flights remind us of the church of San Sebastiano in Mantua, built according to Leon Battista Alberti’s project, and seems to have been inspired by the Roman temple of Claudius. In Lorenzo de’ Medici’s villa of Poggio a Caiano, begun in 1485, such a pattern had been adopted for the first time in a private building, introducing a complete metamorphosis of this type. Vasari records that several architects proposed drawings for this villa and if such a competition had taken place before Leonardo left Florence in 1482, the latter could have seen sketches or models, like those of Giuliano da Sangallo, and perhaps even proposed his own project. This could explain his interest for architectural features in his Adoration, a concern less present in his other paintings. No document confirms the hypothesis of a direct link between Lorenzo’s villa and the ruin of the Adoration, but it is sure that the latter one is nearly connected to the entourage of Lorenzo de’ Medici who promoted in this years a renewal of architectural typologies and idioms, founded on the principles of Leon Battista Alberti, the spiritus rector of Lorenzo’s youth. When Perugino finished in 1496 another Adoration for the Augustans of San Scopeto he privileged the poor stable conformingly to the biblical tradition, perhaps as required by the monks. Leonardo’s ruin as building-site, as an original metaphor of the new Christian religion, had only little Nachleben. A significant testimony is however an Adoration about 1522/1523 attributed to Sebastiano Serlio, who could have known Leonardo’s bold architectural background through his master Baldassarre Peruzzi.

Abstract: The paper discusses the development of the theory of the classical orders of architecture in Russia in the XVIII – XIX centuries. The special significance of the works of professors of the Institute of Civil Engineers in the development of classical theory and in the education of outstanding architects is revealed. The problems and the need for teaching order theory for modern students are analyzed. The structure of the presentation of the most important concepts and techniques of classical architecture is indicated. A clear structuring of information will allow architects and restorers to freely operate a system of order architectural forms in the design.